Chapter 28

Cross-Departmental Review of crime reduction

Scope

The cross-departmental review of crime reduction considered the scope for reducing crime by more effective action locally and by using social, environmental and other programmes outside the Criminal Justice System to tackle factors associated with the onset or continuance of offending. The review was led by a Steering Group whose members were drawn from the police, local government and academia as well as from Whitehall Departments. The Group considered papers submitted by those departments and visited schools, estates, clinics, crime prevention projects and the police.

Background

28.1 Reducing crime is one of the Government's top priorities. The cost of crime to the UK economy has been estimated at up to £50 billion per year. Retailers suffer losses of around £2 billion a year. This raises costs and prices and discourages businesses from starting up and expanding. Crime imposes direct costs on other public services from schools to libraries. The NHS faces the cost of treating 700,000 victims of assault each year. Crime accentuates inequalities in wealth and opportunity, by depressing house prices, raising insurance premiums and encouraging people to leave high crime communities.

28.2 The Government pledged to be tough on crime and is delivering on this pledge with extra resources for police, courts and prisons. The evidence is that further action must be concentrated:

in the 10 per cent of areas which suffer 40 per cent of crime;
on the 2 per cent of people who suffer 41 per cent of property crime;
on the 1 per cent of people who suffer 59 per cent of all violent crime; and
on the 43 per cent of all violence against women which occurs in the home.

28.3 The Government also pledged to be tough on the causes of crime. Evidence suggests that social and environmental programmes have an important part to play here. For example:

30 per cent of prisoners truanted when they were at school;
63 per cent of young offenders aged 15-20 have reading skills below NVQ Level 1;
40 per cent of young prisoners have been in care;
42 per cent of young remand prisoners need mental health treatment; and
40 per cent of violent crimes, 78 per cent of assaults and 88 per cent of criminal damage offences involve misuse of alcohol.

28.4 Many offenders abuse drugs. This problem was considered by the cross-departmental review of Illegal Drugs (see Chapter 29).

Outcomes

28.5 The cross-departmental review of crime reduction concluded that extra impetus should be given to the work of local Crime and Disorder Partnerships and that social and environmental programmes should take more account of their potential for also delivering crime reduction benefits.

28.6 As a result of this cross-departmental review:

there will be significant new investment in local crime reduction activity. For example, the Home Office will help the 376 local Crime and Disorder Partnerships to develop their infrastructure, so that they can identify local problems crossing the crime, health, education and environment boundaries. The partnerships will be able to oversee solutions based on contributions from all local agencies;
the Home Office will continue its Crime Reduction Programme collecting further evidence of effective crime reduction measures;
the Department for Education and Employment (DfEE) will ensure that initiatives to reduce truancy take account of their crime reduction potential and involve partnership working with the police who have new powers to pick up truants;
the Department of Health will fund implementation of the National Strategy on Alcohol Misuse over the three year period. It will make new investments in child, adolescent and adult mental health services. It will also ensure that local health services participate in the Crime and Disorder Partnerships;
the Children's Fund will build on the On Track and Youth Inclusion programmes of support respectively for families and teenagers at risk of becoming involved in crime;
the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR) will make additional supported housing provision for victims of domestic violence;
the DETR will also ensure that local authorities screen planning applications for their crime implications with the help of the police. Where necessary, they may either insist on appropriate crime prevention measures or refuse the application; and
Public Service Agreement targets, as summarised in Box 28.1, will be incorporated in departmental PSAs.

Box 28.1: Key PSA targets - Crime Reduction

The Department for Education and Employment (DfEE) will set targets to increase the percentage of 14 year olds at or above the required standards of literacy, numeracy, ICT and science. It will also set a minimum performance target to result in higher standards for the bottom 20 per cent of pupils and narrow the attainment gap.
In addition, DfEE will set a target to increase pupil inclusion by reducing school truancies by a further 10 per cent from the level achieved by 2002 and ensuring that all pupils who are permanently excluded obtain an appropriate full-time education.
The Department of Health will set a target to reduce the difference between the proportion of looked after children who have been cautioned or convicted and the proportion of children in the general population who have been cautioned or convicted.
The Home Office will set a target to reduce the key recorded crime categories of vehicle crime by 30 per cent by 2004; domestic burglary by 25 per cent by 2005, with no local authority area having a rate more than three times the national average; and robbery in our principal cities by 14 per cent by 2005.

Spending plans

28.7 Planned Home Office spending on crime reduction programmes is set out in Table

28.1. Additional sums for crime-reducing activities will flow through other departments' programmes.

Table 28.1 Key figures

£ million
	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04
Home Office programmes for Crime Reduction	100	164	165	160